Before i fall by Lauren Oliver is about a girl named Sam, Samantha Kingston. The main characters would be her best friends, Lindsay, Elody, and Ally, the odd girl out Juliet Sykes or more commonly know throughout the book as Psycho, Kent McFuller, former bestfriend, Rob her boyfriend, and Izzy her younger sister. It is set in Ridgemont, Connecticut, but the majority of the story takes place at her high school Thomas Jefferson High and at Kent McFuller's house.
In the very beginning of this story Sam dies in a car accident. After that she gets seven more days to relive her last day, going through almost everything the same way and realizing she has the power to change how everything turns out in the end.
assignment two
What seems special to me in this book is just how it is written in general. Lauren Oliver is repeating what should be the same story seven different times but she gives each one its own little twist or sometimes even a major turn of events.
Another thing it thought was special about this book were the flashback at the beginning of each section, which showed the beginning of another day. Each flashback had several quotes in it that were either really touching or they really grabbed your attention. Also each flashback made it seem as if Sam were talking to the reader, not to herself or her friends, but trying to pull you into her story as well.
(pg 81) "Before you start pointing fingers, let me ask you: is what I did really so bad? So bad I deserved to die? So bad I deserved to die like that? Is what I did really so much worse than what anybody else does?
Is it really so much worse than what you do?
Think about it."
(pg 132) " Do you think I was being stupid? Naive?
Try not to judge. Remember that we're the same, you and me.
I thought that I would live forever too."
assignment three
I think the theme of this book is just to show people to really think about what they are doing with their lives. We never know when their going to end, and if today was our last day would we be proud of how we decided to spend it? Would we be the girls making fun of those who we think are lesser than us? Or would we be the ones being made fun of, just trying to fit in and make our way through our last two years of high school? This book really shows what high school is like from all different angles because on each day she lives it a different way and on her very last she lives it just how she would have wanted to be remembered.
(pg 194) "Here's one of the things I learned that morning; if you cross a line and nothing happens, the line loses meaning.. You keep drawing a line farther and farther away, crossing it every time. That's how people end up stepping off the edge of the earth. You'd be surprised at how easy it is to bust out of orbit, to spin out to a place where no one can touch you. To lose yourself-- to get lost.
Or maybe you wouldn't be surprised. Maybe some of you already know.
To those people i can only say: I'm sorry."
(pg 268) "My point is; maybe you can afford to wait. Maybe for you there's a tomorrow... But for some of us there's only today. And the truth is, you never really know."
(pg 469) "They say that just before you die your whole life flashes before your eyes, but that's not how it happens for me. I see only my greatest hits. The things I want to remember, and be remembered for... Even after they're over they still go on, even after you're dead and buried, those moments are lasting still, backward and forward, on into infinity. They are everything and everywhere all at once.
They are the meaning."
assignment four
I think that this book was a pretty good experience for me. It showed me a different writing technique, and it was definitely one that I liked. Like I mentioned before the flashbacks that were included were very attention grabbing and kept you involved with the book. I think that this was a very good use of my time, because of all that I just mentioned. The subtle yet major differences day to day also kept you wrapped up in the book. In the end I really enjoyed this book. While reading I wasn't quite sure whether I liked it or not, but as I got closer to the end I realized how much I liked it. It especially hit me when I was done and really got to process what took place in the story. It ended well and that gave it an extra push to how much I liked it. This book was a fairly easy read but it had some complex parts in it so I would probably recommend it mostly to 8th and 9th grade readers. Something that wasn't so good in this book would probably be how repetitive it could be, the first two days that she repeated were extremely similar and took up a large portion of the book. After a while you already knew what was going to happen and were very tempted to just skip to the next day. Another problem I had with it was how easy it was to read in some parts, I like to challenge myself when I read and this book definitely didn't challenge me. After everything though, I still really like this book and encourage everyone to read it because I think that it's an experience everyone should have.
Lauren Oliver
assignment one
Before i fall by Lauren Oliver is about a girl named Sam, Samantha Kingston. The main characters would be her best friends, Lindsay, Elody, and Ally, the odd girl out Juliet Sykes or more commonly know throughout the book as Psycho, Kent McFuller, former bestfriend, Rob her boyfriend, and Izzy her younger sister. It is set in Ridgemont, Connecticut, but the majority of the story takes place at her high school Thomas Jefferson High and at Kent McFuller's house.In the very beginning of this story Sam dies in a car accident. After that she gets seven more days to relive her last day, going through almost everything the same way and realizing she has the power to change how everything turns out in the end.
assignment two
What seems special to me in this book is just how it is written in general. Lauren Oliver is repeating what should be the same story seven different times but she gives each one its own little twist or sometimes even a major turn of events.Another thing it thought was special about this book were the flashback at the beginning of each section, which showed the beginning of another day. Each flashback had several quotes in it that were either really touching or they really grabbed your attention. Also each flashback made it seem as if Sam were talking to the reader, not to herself or her friends, but trying to pull you into her story as well.
(pg 81)
"Before you start pointing fingers, let me ask you: is what I did really so bad? So bad I deserved to die? So bad I deserved to die like that?
Is what I did really so much worse than what anybody else does?
Is it really so much worse than what you do?
Think about it."
(pg 132)
" Do you think I was being stupid? Naive?
Try not to judge. Remember that we're the same, you and me.
I thought that I would live forever too."
assignment three
I think the theme of this book is just to show people to really think about what they are doing with their lives. We never know when their going to end, and if today was our last day would we be proud of how we decided to spend it? Would we be the girls making fun of those who we think are lesser than us? Or would we be the ones being made fun of, just trying to fit in and make our way through our last two years of high school? This book really shows what high school is like from all different angles because on each day she lives it a different way and on her very last she lives it just how she would have wanted to be remembered.(pg 194)
"Here's one of the things I learned that morning; if you cross a line and nothing happens, the line loses meaning.. You keep drawing a line farther and farther away, crossing it every time. That's how people end up stepping off the edge of the earth. You'd be surprised at how easy it is to bust out of orbit, to spin out to a place where no one can touch you. To lose yourself-- to get lost.
Or maybe you wouldn't be surprised. Maybe some of you already know.
To those people i can only say: I'm sorry."
(pg 268)
"My point is; maybe you can afford to wait. Maybe for you there's a tomorrow... But for some of us there's only today. And the truth is, you never really know."
(pg 469)
"They say that just before you die your whole life flashes before your eyes, but that's not how it happens for me. I see only my greatest hits. The things I want to remember, and be remembered for... Even after they're over they still go on, even after you're dead and buried, those moments are lasting still, backward and forward, on into infinity. They are everything and everywhere all at once.
They are the meaning."
assignment four
I think that this book was a pretty good experience for me. It showed me a different writing technique, and it was definitely one that I liked. Like I mentioned before the flashbacks that were included were very attention grabbing and kept you involved with the book. I think that this was a very good use of my time, because of all that I just mentioned. The subtle yet major differences day to day also kept you wrapped up in the book. In the end I really enjoyed this book. While reading I wasn't quite sure whether I liked it or not, but as I got closer to the end I realized how much I liked it. It especially hit me when I was done and really got to process what took place in the story. It ended well and that gave it an extra push to how much I liked it. This book was a fairly easy read but it had some complex parts in it so I would probably recommend it mostly to 8th and 9th grade readers. Something that wasn't so good in this book would probably be how repetitive it could be, the first two days that she repeated were extremely similar and took up a large portion of the book. After a while you already knew what was going to happen and were very tempted to just skip to the next day. Another problem I had with it was how easy it was to read in some parts, I like to challenge myself when I read and this book definitely didn't challenge me. After everything though, I still really like this book and encourage everyone to read it because I think that it's an experience everyone should have.